This Month's ONE Thing: Your team members want to be able to talk about their mental health.

This is especially true for your younger workers. 91% of Gen Z job seekers told Monster that they want to be able to talk about their mental health at work. But this is also true for all of your team members. Most likely, they are experiencing higher levels of stress, anxiety, and other mental health issues. The World Health Organization reported that anxiety and depression have increased 25% worldwide as a result of the pandemic. According to a Boston University study, rates of depression in the U.S. have tripled since the onset of the pandemic.

In recognition of Mental Health Awareness Month (and the time we’re in), what can you do as a manager right now to make it safe for your team members to talk about their mental health?

1. Acknowledge.

The first step is to just acknowledge what we’ve all gone through. Here’s an exercise you might try out with your team. Give them the simple prompt: “The pandemic became real for me when…” – and then let them finish the sentence.

Here are some things you might hear:

• The pandemic became real for me when I went to the grocery store and there was no toilet paper.
• The pandemic became real for me when the NBA shut down.
• The pandemic became real for me when my kids were sent home from school.

You might also hear more distressful responses like…

• The pandemic became real for me when I woke up in the morning and I couldn’t smell my coffee.
• The pandemic became real for me when I had difficulty breathing.
• Or, the pandemic became real for me when I lost my husband.

Not one of us has escaped from the pandemic unscathed. And at the same time, some of us have been impacted much more so than others. Just the simple act of acknowledgment can make a big difference in helping every one of your team members to heal and find hope.

2. Just listen.

Evidence suggests that most of your team members are afraid to talk about their mental health. In fact, a Paychex study found that over half of employees are afraid to talk about their mental health with their boss. Is that the case for you?

One way to begin inviting real conversation is by slowing down, asking real questions and then listening. It might as simple as asking, “How are you? No really, how are you?” These moments of authentic asking and listening can go a long way.

This is something that Chester Elton, coauthor of Anxiety at Work (with Adrian Gostick), has a lot to say about. Chester, who is a #1 bestselling author, and co-founder of Culture Works, ranked #3 in the world’s top organizational culture experts by Global Gurus, was the most recent guest on my LinkedIn Live. I got so many gems from our conversation, particularly on the idea of just listening. ?

“When a manager communicates ‘I notice you,’ that translates into ‘I care about you,’” Chester shared with me. Chester went on to explain that once a manager makes it okay for a team member to talk about what's going on at work, it opens the door to that team member to begin sharing about what's going on in their personal life.

In response to the common “I’m not a counselor” pushback from some managers, Chester clarified: ‘Here's what your people want you to do – and it's one thing that we can all do. They want you to listen. They just want you to listen.”

Tune in for more of these gems by tuning into the full LinkedIn Live with Chester.

3.?Move.

There are also really simple things you can do like adding motion to your meetings. Movement is medicine, including medicine for our mental health. According to a Duke Medical study, for example, exercise is as effective as Zoloft in treating depression.

But it’s more than that. Movement actually primes us to connect with others, according to a study that came out of Sapienza University in Rome. Therefore, moving together as a team can serve as an effective way to foster more connection and build more trust – two things that we need a lot more of right now.

One manager shared with me that she had been trying to get her team members to be open to coaching, but they resisted it. Then, after she converted her one on ones into walking meetings, every one of her team members came up to her and individually asked for that coaching. In other words, the walking meetings created the foundation of trust for her and her team members to engage in a higher level of learning and receiving feedback.

Listen to a conversation with Julia Gaynor, host of Monster Intelligence Podcast.

In my conversation with Julia, we talked a lot about the unexpected mental health benefits of getting your team in motion.

4. Create an oasis.

Finally, no matter what’s happening across the larger organization, not to mention our world, you can create an oasis of well-being and empathy for your team . You can carve out a safe harbor. And, you can do so with simple practices like moving together as a team (as discussed above), as well as building psychological safety and awakening compassion within the team.

One of the final gems that Chester offered up in his conversation with me was: “Laura if you'd asked me five years ago, what are the attributes of great leaders? I would have said, ‘Oh, transparent, great communicator. You know, a great motivator.’ Now there's only one attribute that matters. And if you don't have it, the rest doesn’t matter. And it's empathy. If your employees don't believe that you care about them, not just as workers but as people, you're going to lose the war for talent.”

The goal here is to foster a team environment in which every single team member feels a little bit more cared for, a little bit more well, a little bit more seen and heard because of the team that they are on and because of the boss they work with.

While we often talk about self-care, the real key here is team-care. Instead of just relying on individuals to equip themselves with resiliency-building tools (like mindfulness, deep breathing, and yoga), you can think more about creating the foundation for your team where everyone has each other’s backs. A team where everyone is looking out for one another. A team where everyone is making the extra effort. A team in which members tune into questions like:

• Are there any who feel left out?
• Are there any whose voices are not being heard?
• Are there any who are checking out?

You have a critical role to play right now in safeguarding the emotional well-being of your team members. Yes, senior leaders need to demonstrate vulnerability in talking openly about their own mental health to destigmatize these kinds of conversations across the organization, but you are the one who is on the front line, and your team members are counting on you to lead the way through empathy.

Let’s Talk Mega-Trends!?

Tune in on Wednesday, May 25th at 10 am PT for a LinkedIn Live with my good friend, Mitch Marten, Senior Wellness Manager for Northern Arizona Healthcare in Flagstaff, Ariz. to discuss the Mega-Trends in Workplace Well-Being. We’ll be discussing some of the biggest trends in well-being that every professional needs to know.?

RSVP, here! ?

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:?

Laura Putnam , CEO, Motion Infusion & Author of?Workplace Wellness That Works ?on the focus areas when it comes to the well-being of employees.?Motion Infusion ?is on a mission to promote employee health, happiness, and well-being. Laura Putnam is a leading catalyst for well-being at work, an international public speaker, and author of “Workplace Wellness That Works.” As CEO of Motion Infusion and creator of the leadership training program Managers on the Move, she infuses well-being into the workplace to help employees, teams and organizations thrive. Subscribe to Laura’s newsletter,?here.?